TheCable

The Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) has described the New Year message by President Bola Tinubu to Nigerians as a “harvest of deceit, false claims and empty promises”.

In his New Year broadcast on Monday, Tinubu, among other things, promised to implement a new living wage for workers and fast-track power projects.

The president also said his ministers and other appointees would have to be stellar performers to keep their jobs, adding that parameters have been set to evaluate the performance of cabinet members.

Reacting in a statement, Debo Ologunagba, PDP spokesperson, said Tinubu’s speech was “unpresidential, uninspiring and amounts to a waste of valuable time as it did not address any of the critical issues plaguing the nation”.

Ologunagba said Nigerians were “dismayed” as Tinubu “employed rhetoric and failed to address the critical issues of insecurity, decayed infrastructure, comatose” manufacturing and productive sectors; inflation rate, naira depreciation, unemployment and poverty” in the country.

“More distressing is that President Tinubu had no words in his New Year address for the Christmas Eve genocidal massacre of over 200 Nigerians by terrorists in Plateau State and the murder of over 5000 citizens in Plateau and other States of the federation under his watch since May 29, 2023,” the statement reads.

Ologunagba said the president’s address was an “unpardonable assault on the sensibility of Nigerians”, claiming that his foreign trips have not benefitted the citizens.

He said Tinubu ought to have used the opportunity of the New Year message to “apologise to Nigerians and marshal out steps to address our national challenges, including those responsible for the exiting of multinational manufacturing companies and other businesses from our country”.

“What Nigerians demand of President Tinubu is to provide a comprehensive account of our nation’s earnings, including the proceeds from the removal of subsidy on petroleum products, especially in the face of allegations that the earnings are being diverted to private pockets,” Ologunagba added.

The opposition party spokesperson asked the national assembly to “step up” and perform its oversight functions by holding the executive arm accountable for its actions.